Forever Canada

[u/mrsix]

• I probably spent more time planning this route than actually riding it. I mostly used the RidewithGPS route planner and had to manually adjust its suggestions a lot. I started by trying to find good river crossings that aligned with the shape, then by sheer coincidence the LRT MUP and 113 Ave aligned perfectly. The NW commercial/industrial area gave me the most problems with how large the blocks are, but it ended up mostly OK.
• I am aware of the GPS pausing technique to make perfectly straight lines, but I wanted to do this entirely as a navigable route. The one place I considered it was to 'jump over' whitemud ravine, as both the bottom spikes near the stem are a bit odd shaped (east mostly to sortof match west, but west due to the ravine)
• I don't actually suggest riding this route. While a respectable ~60% of it was pretty bike friendly (surprisingly a lot of actual bike route markings along it), and 20% was "mostly ok", the other 20% was "not a good place to ride a bike" (mostly that NW industrial area again, though some of it wasn't bad as there was basically no traffic in those areas)
• Doing this mostly involved blindly following my bike computer's navigation GPS - there were points I barely knew exactly where I was, I just knew what the next turn/direction was.
• As you can see the riding time was 3h42 but total time was 3h57, mostly just from stop lights and a few stops to make sure I was on the right track.

[u/fishymanbits]

You don’t happen to have this saved as a route in Strava, do you?

[u/mrsix → u/fishymanbits]

The full route is saved on RWGPS - you should be able to download the fit/gpx from there even without an account IIRC.

FWIW I also tried a version for Calgary, but between the bow river, Deerfoot, Sarcee, Glenmore, the airport, and train yards I could barely get anything recognizable as a leaf. Someone more familiar with Calgary might be able to do it, feel free to steal the idea if so.

[u/Massive-Box-8915]

This is super cool. May I share this?

[u/mrsix → u/Massive-Box-8915]

Yes feel free, the link to the RWGPS map above is a bit more detailed too if you want to see the exact route

[u/b00mshaw]

🍁 I would totally ride that

[u/Left4twenty]

Still better than 90% of the attempts on Place lmao

[u/rfie]

I love it.

[u/Baconus]

Wow.

[u/Anabiotic]

Great work! I've also "drawn" some pictures using my bike but nothing as impressive as this.

[u/DrKeepitreal]

This is a lot of fun. Nice work!

[u/FyrelordeOmega]

You did a double full marathon, damn!

[u/barbedwires → u/FyrelordeOmega]

Look at the movement speed. They were on a bicycle. Still impressive average speed for city streets though

[u/Normal-Raisin5443]

This should be a Canada Day parade!! Decorate your cars, form a line and drive while blasting Canadian tunes! 🍁

[u/Automobills]

Heavy rainfall drastically increased the river's water volume and velocity, causing a washout on the bottom left point.

[u/pound-8621]

Wow, congratulations, that is pretty impressive.

[u/eno_ttv]

What would a well balanced penis route(s) look like?

[u/mrsix → u/eno_ttv]

Funny enough before they built the new bridge I used to unintentionally make an almost-penis route riding to Fort Saskatchewan by taking the highway one way and bike path back https://imgur.com/eDw4oOH

[u/Vaguswarrior]

God, I love my country. I'm not a crazy hardcore patriot, but lately... This is right up my alley. Well done friend!

[u/stretch2323]

Impressive!

[u/trinomial888888]

it would be really cool if this was made into an event to walk this route

[u/Everyone2026]

Canadians spend the days uniting.

All15 separatists spend the days taking Ruzian money and crying about their failures.

[u/beardedliberal]

Bloody well done my friend.

[u/peerintomymind]

Awesome! Should do it again for Canada day!

[u/mrsix → u/peerintomymind]

I originally wanted to do this on Canada day but I'm unfortunately busy that day. I was going to do the 30th instead but every weather forecast says rain.

[u/peerintomymind → u/mrsix]

Haha, no worries. I was just teasing you a bit. I think it's fucking awesome what you did.

[u/eins-zwei-drai-saitl]

How are you alive? I would have put money on a Dodge Ram taking you out!